More than 1.75 lakh BSNL employees yet to get salaries

Due to the financial crisis, 1.76 lakh employees of the government telecom company BSNL (Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited) have not received salaries in the month of February. This is the first time in telecom history that the salary of employees of BSNL has been stuck. So far, employees were paid salaries till the first working day of next month or by the last day of every month.

According to the English newspaper Times of India, this condition of BSNL is due to the price war with the private telecom companies. According to the report, BSNL employees spends around 1200 crore rupees every month on salaries. It is 55 percent of the company’s total income. While this budget increases 8 percent every year. It means that the company’s expenditure on pay is increasing steadily, while the income is constantly falling.

Meanwhile, BSNL employees’ organization All Union and Association of AUAB has written a letter to Communications Minister Manoj Sinha. The company has requested the minister to intervene in the matter. According to the employees, the Modi government is conspiring to shut down BSNL. They have continued to perform in the country constantly.

BSNL, a government company operating in the bandwidth, including landline and broadband service in India, has been in constant loss for the last three years. This loss is increasing. The company has shown a loss of Rs 4,793 crore in 2016-17. The company recorded a loss of around Rs 8,000 crore for FY18. According to the guidelines issued by the Department of Public Enterprises, BSNL has been declared ‘Incipient Sick’.

What is the reason for this situation

According to the experts the reason behind this situation of BSNL is the telecom industry’s price war in the market. Since the entry of Reliance Jio in 2016, the price war has risen and private companies made their plans cheaper. When several companies merged, then some companies were forced to cooperate with the telecom industry. In this war, the government company BSNL also joined, but during this time its financial health was affected.